Origins of the Arab-Israeli Conflict, Pre-State to 1973

Explore the pivotal events, influential leaders, and crucial decisions from the Ottoman era to the Yom Kippur War that transformed the Land of Israel into the hard-earned home of the first Jewish state in 2,000 years but also the site of continual intercommunal violence.

How did the Zionist vision of Jewish revival and self-determination in the ancient Jewish homeland, as executed by leaders such as Theodor Herzl, David Ben-Gurion, and Golda Meir and aided by the Jewish Diaspora, increasingly clash with the development of Palestinian Arab nationalism and survive through wars in 1947-49, 1956, 1967, and 1973?

This course is made up of four sections:

• Part I: Zionism and State Building to 1939 — How Zionist immigration to the Land of Israel and the change from Ottoman to British rule enabled Jewish state building and sparked a violent Arab response. Pragmatic Zionist decision-making succeeded over the polemics of Arab leaders.
• Part II: The Shoah and the State, 1939-1949 — Zionists began evolving the state half a century before the Holocaust. Some Arabs collaborated with Zionists; others adamantly resisted. Arabs failed to match Jewish communal and institution building and the Zionists’ international push to declare and secure the state.
• Part III: The Formative Years to the 1967 War, 1949-1967 — How Israel survived despite no fixed borders, massive absorption of immigrants and the rejection of its neighbors, in the context of Egyptian-led pan-Arab nationalism and the creation of the PLO.
• Part IV: From the June to the October Wars, 1967-1973 — How Israel’s sudden victory in 1967 forever altered the conflict, leading to settlement building and a new Egyptian leader, Anwar Sadat, seeking his land back via a combination of war and then diplomacy.

What You’ll Learn

Upon completing this course, you will have a deep and clear understanding of the roots and evolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict through 1973, including:

• Zionism’s emergence from the Jewish past linked to the land, angering the Arab population.
• Such key documents as the Sykes-Picot Agreement, the Balfour Declaration, and U.N. Resolutions 181 and 242.
• British failure to reconcile Jews and Arabs on matters of immigration and land sales.
• U.N. partition’s rejection by the Arabs and acceptance by the Zionists.
• Independence for Israel but no Arab state of Palestine in 1948.
• Israel’s absorption of Jewish refugees while Palestinian refugees were dispersed and not embraced by Arab states.
• International influences of the Cold War, the thirst for Middle Eastern oil and increased Arab hostility for Israel after the 1967 war.

And much more.

Estimated Completion Time: 1 hour*

* Those who want to dive deeper into these and ancillary topics will find accompanying sources that can keep you learning for hours on end.